Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, a candidate for governor, attends a 2017 nurses union gathering in support of singe payer. (Photo: Chris Allan)It goes by various names: Universal Healthcare Access; National Healthcare; Medicare for All; government-run health care; Socialized Medicine. Most news reports call it Single Payer. It threatens to tear asunder California’s Democratic Party.
A posed image of a rape victim in a dark tunnel, with the shadow of the rapist in the background. (Photo: ChameleonsEye, via Shutterstock)Thousands of California women who said they were raped gave details of their assaults to investigators and provided critical data in “rape kits” — DNA, wounds, semen, hair, fibers — to identify their attackers. But many of the rape kits were not examined in a timely way, caught in a backlog that has angered some lawmakers and women’s groups.
The crowd at a 2016 political rally in Santa Monica. (Photo: Joseph Sohm)One of the ongoing themes in analyzing California’s 2018 elections is the impact of the reforms that were enacted in 2012 – the state’s open primary, the extension of term limits and the new district lines drawn by the state’s independent redistricting commission. Beyond these three, we also saw the creation of statewide online voter registration and a ballot measure to allow passage of an on-time state budget by a simple majority vote. This wave of reforms has made it incredibly difficult to discern the impact of each.
O'Shaughnessy Dam at Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, the source of water for San Francisco. (Photo: Gary Saxe. via Shutterstock)Camrosa Water District, a public services provider in Ventura County, gets its water from a combination of groundwater, recycled wastewater, and the State Water Project, which transports water south through the state. Twenty miles away, another mid-size public water agency also founded around 1960 has a very different portfolio: Las Virgenes Municipal Water District gets virtually all its water from the State Water Project, which is managed by California’s Department of Water Resources.
Stem cell embroyo, mitosis under a microscope. (Photo: Andrii Vodolazhskyi. via Shutterstock)California’s drive to produce a stem cell therapy is ratcheting up a notch with announcement of two new, global industry partners along with a plan to engage more companies and give them “direct access” to hundreds of millions of dollars in state-funded research.
The CalPERS headquarters in Sacramento. (Photo Shutterstock)A bill by state Sen. Steven Glazer, D-Orinda, giving new state workers the option new University of California workers received two years ago, a 401(k)-style plan rather than a pension, is opposed by unions and soon may be opposed by CalPERS. More than a third of eligible new UC employees have chosen a 401(k)-style plan. Instead of a guaranteed lifetime monthly pension check, the 401(k) plan that replaced pensions in most of the private sector uses individual tax-deferred investments to build a retirement fund.
A young Laitno student studies in a college library. (Photo: Manuela Durson)The number of Latinos in California with two- and four-year degrees has doubled in little more than a decade, a dramatic increase. But compared with the overall, growing Latino population, the proportion of college-trained Latino adults over the same period has remained flat — roughly one in 10 from 2005 to 2015. The figures are from a new study commissioned by Univision’s Political, Advocacy and Government Group — which is separate from the network’s news division — on Latinos’ access to higher education in California and reflect the obstacles facing Latinos seeking a college education.
A bicyclist rides by debris following the 1994 Northridge quake. (Photo: Joseph Sohm)The images of California’s powerful earthquakes over the years have been vivid — the shattered buildings, the collapsed bridges, the buckled highways. A Los Angeles lawmaker is proposing updated earthquake legislation geared toward saving infrastructure, noting that modern building codes are designed to save lives but not necessarily preserve the physical structures.
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti and friend at the Rose Parade on Jan. 1 in Pasadena. (Photo: Karl_Sonnenberg)He runs an entity that boasts more population than 21 states plus Puerto Rico. He is good-looking, well-spoken, and he’s thinking about running for president. He is, of course, L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti.
Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Torrance, addressing the Democratic National Convention in 2016. (Photo: Mark J. Terrill/Associated Press)Rep. Ted Lieu says he’s surprised by how much reaction he’s gotten nationally for his anti-Trump and other pointed tweets. The Southern California Democrat, whose district includes Beverly Hills and Malibu, said he’s been tweeting since long before the president took office. “I decided when I was a state legislator that I was going to tell the truth,” he said.